I was interested to see that the FIA’s new Women in Motorsport commission has met for the first time, under the presidency of former rally star Michele Mouton.

Mouton: New commission president

It was one of the first measures introduced by Jean Todt when he took over as FIA president in October last year. Women are not well represented in the highest levels of motor sport and one of the main reasons for that is that there is no parallel series for women competitors as there is in tennis, athletics, soccer and other sports. In motor racing women compete directly against men, like Mouton herself in the early 1980s, where she won four world championship rounds, and nowadays Danica Patrick in Indycar and Katherine Legge in DTM.

This is just the way things have evolved over the years and it has led to a pretty low representation of women participating, partly because the federation hasn’t taken an active role at looking at ways of improving things. Now that has changed.

“Like many international federations, we will support, promote and help advance the participation of women in motor sport to ensure equal opportunities at all levels,’” said Todt in his statement today.

But it’s not just about finding women to race at the highest levels, it’s about encouraging women to engage at all levels in all roles. Many women work today in F1, as engineers and tyre technicians as well as in the more traditional roles of hospitality, pr and promotion. The paddock is not a male dominated environment any more, hasn’t been for the last ten years. Sauber is trying out a female team manager for the second time in its history and there are some very senior women in Bernie Ecclestone’s FOM organisation.

“The WMC aims to put in place strategies and policies that will promote education and training, and put into practice actions and events that will strengthen the participation of women in all areas of motor sport,” said the FIA.

It is common for young girls to be very competitive in karting but then the difficulty of finding funding and being taken seriously as they work their way up the ladder means a significant drop off in numbers. Who’s to say that the sport hasn’t lost a potential Vettel in the last five years?

It will be very interesting to see what progress this commission makes and how long it is before a woman driver makes it into F1. It cannot come soon enough.

I agree, and there are 4 women in Indycar this season who HAVE earned their place (Simona De Silvestro, Danica Patrick, Ana Bratriz and the always excellent value Sarah Fisher).

Outside that you have Buemi’s cousin Gachnang in FIA GT1 (although ironically she had the same accident as him only more serious on the same day) and in an all women line up in a Matech Ford GT at Le Mans. You’ve got Pippa Mann in Indy Lights, Susie Stoddart in DTM (outqualifying Coulthard and Schumacher last week).

It’s not equal but nor should it be, but there ARE women in top level motorsport and there because they’ve earned it by being bloody fast or (at least partially in Sarah’s case) through sheer passion and commitment to the sport.

Danica though has NOT helped. Every bit of exposure she has is because she spends 20% of her time motorsporting and the rest of her time looking for creative ways to be pictured in her underwear. She’s trying to put women being taken seriously back years.

I agree, women shouldn’t be given an easier route into motorsport, but the fact that there are so few, shows that they could do with some encouragement at least. Equal opportunities. And yes, Danica Patrick has not helped the image of women in motorsport, or of what men expect from women in motorsport.

But that’s led to you seeing Danica as “Someone in her underwear” and not “Serious racing driver”.

Danica is the Anna Kournikova of motor racing and about as successful. Not a huge problem with Anna because we had Steffi Graf, we had Capriati, Seles and Navratilova. Plus the women tennis players were only playing other women.

In motor racing Danica is the only game in town for a lot of people and I really don’t think it helps. Compare and contrast to say, Sarah Fisher, a woman who loves the sport so much she’s running her own team to stay in it and is a little ball of enthusiasm in any interview.

In a world where women drivers’ biggest problem is reputation and perception, one of those people is helping and one isn’t.

That said, neither does Milka Duno, the Yuji Ide of Indycar. By all accounts an excellent person but at Long Beach she was well over 10 seconds off the next slowest Indycar. She’s no more a ride buyer than Yuji was but let’s really hope no-one assumes she’s any more indication of the speed of females than Yuji was of the men.

Wait a minute….
Doesn’t David Beckham and a whole host of other male sports stars constantly do semi naked ads for money? I think I’ve seen Beckhams torse more times than he has! But no one says anything, it doesn’t make women (or men) have less respect for him.
In saying about Danica, you are being sexist because you are applying harser rules for men than for women. She is promoting herself in the exact way that many male sports stars do. The only difference is, she’s female. This kind of attitude is why sexism is still so persistent in society.

No Dudley. I’ve seen her race and get right in somebody’s face when she’s felt wronged. And I’ve seen her in street clothes and in bikinis. Its led to me seeing her as a kick-ass driver/babe that I wouldn’t want to mess with.

if she is fast, give her a chance. But having an also run just because she is a woman, it’s as bad as having a driver with a suit case. It’s taking a space that can be used by some other more talented driver.

I agree with that sentiment – I don’t care who races, as long as they do it well and are the best that can be. WHOEVER they are, if they are not telented enough, stay away, and there are a few male names that could easily be mentioned that fit that bill.

I completely agree, equal opportunities to whoever fits the bill. Unfortunately though, motorsport is not the most accessible sport, if you look at the people participating. I know there are plenty of very notable exceptions, but for the most part the majority of drivers are men, most are european/american, most are white. It is a sport that requires alot of investment of time and resources to enter into, at a young age if you want to really make it. And so encouragement of new competitors has to be a major point for the FIA to pursue. The more accessible it is, the larger the fan base will be and the more talent there will be on the grid.

However, considering how rare female drivers are in top categories, I think this is just inevitable.

It is like Bruno Senna is always going to be compared with Ayrton. It is not his “fault” but is makes a big difference in perception. And if you look at what Danica Patrick is doing, I think you see that she is happily using this to her advantage.

I understand that accepting that looks matter do give a disadvantage to female drivers who are perhaps less attractive. Maybe this injustice can be corrected only with time, as female drivers become more common?

AndyC, you forgot about Simona DE Silvestro, it looks like she is a real racer and quicker than Patrick. Good to see as I’m getting (already got) tired of Patrick! Duno is certainly not doing the womens’ movement any good.
PK.

actually, there will be three women in this year Indy 500 edition: Danica Patric, Sarah Fisher and Milka Duno. So there is a trend to employ more women drivers at least in the Indy Series. Whathever we need separate racing leagues for women, I personally doubt. Mrs Mouton has proven that ladies can compete against man, although in other sport than rally spectacular results are still missiong.

Hannu Mikkola and Stig Blomqvist also had works Audi Quattros at their disposal, but it was Mouton won challenged for the 1982 title. She could have won it too, had it not been for some Audi reliability issues.

and some of us want it to stay like this.
At valencia they used men to do that job the first year, i imagine to attract women to the sport, but i doubt the did. What i am sure it’s that they convinced me not to go there.
This is a men’s sport, so do take care of us.
Most women are busy shopping and talking on the cellular phone. That’s what they like.

Marques, this is a dangerous subject, but I’m inclined to agree with you! Although I’d be very interested in seeing a female up near the top by her own merrits, (driving, not bumps on her chest), and De Silvestro might be the one.
PK.

I remember a few years ago Louise Goodman on a F1 ITV broadcast saying that there were no women drivers in F1 because biologically women just didn’t hae the strength to cope with the g-forces in F1. It made me laugh out loud – I’m sure there are plenty of strong girls who could give little Ant a good thrashing…

Im a big fan of Katherine Legge, I loved watching her when she competed in Champcar series, she had a massive crash at Road America, it’s was incredible she walked away…. the car disintegrated, very fortunate girl

Diamond’s interesting actually, all they are is a rebadge of Admiral. If you’re a bloke try and get insurance with them, they WILL actually provide one and in my case it was pretty much the best quote I got.

when it comes to talking, they are second to none, so if the woman have some interest in the sport, she might be as good as any men. Driving it’s a different matter. I really doubt we will see in the next 50 years a woman who is champion material. Unless they keep lowering the horsepower up to a point where even a kid will be able to do it.

There have already been five women drivers in F1. I must confess that that’s four more than I knew about, as I discovered when I went to Wikipedia to look up the name of the one I remembered from the time: Giovanna Amati in 1992. She was the Brabham second driver, but only lasted the first 3 races, none of which she managed to qualify for. In all fairness, the Brabham was dreadful that year. She was replaced by Damon Hill. I recall that the drivers toilet facilities all had to be extended to provide a ‘ladies’.

To be far, Amati would have been a disaster with any gender. She got the job because she had the money to get the team to races. Equal levels of male disaster were being hired by other teams at the same time, Paul Belmondo leaps to mind.

It’s just going to be a slow process, to be accepted we’ll need a woman to start winning in GP2 etc. It’s getting closer, 5 years ago no woman had won a professional motor race, now we have 3. Katherine Legge and Simona de Silvestro both won multiple races in series 1 level below the main Indycar Series and (admittedly with half the field missing and a gigantic scoop of luck) Danica Patrick has won a proper Indycar event.

Change doesn’t happen overnight, most of these women are going about it the right way. Race as hard on equal terms as you can. A Danica, a Sarah, a Simona might just inspire another little girl to go karting. Maybe one of those will win a little more and inspire another, larger group of girls into the sport.

And maybe one of THEM is our Michelle Schumacher, Fernanda Alonso or Louise Hamilton.

In fact I seem to remember driving around the banked circle track at Millabank and there being no lateral G force at all. The angle of the banking being calculated so that the horizontal component of the centripetal force is cancelled out completely.

Not many women are prepared to build their bodies up to the point of being female weightlifters. But they do. And they are remarkably strong. And also I really dont think F1 drivers necks are particularly thick, just rather strong.

Now I should point out that I’m not actively encouraging this to change… but it works both ways you know. When was the last time you saw a male model holding up the grid position markers on the grid?

I’m sure plenty of blokes would love to get that opportunity, but sexism within F1 is rife and some people just won’t let them. Maybe it’s those senior women in FOM blocking them and keeping jobs for the girls?

It’s not like holding up grid markers is preventing them from being doctors and lawyers etc, remember it’s their job. The promotions industry employs thousands of girls who would otherwise be unemployed. You could argue that this is unfair to the lads, however unless Labour stay in power it is unlikely that being gay will eventually be compulsory, only then will we see lads holding the grid markers.

In the UK having a degree is commonplace amongst the shelf stackers who can find no other work, so let’s not begrudge the grid girls their few days of work looking delectable.

Good to see Michele Mouton’s superb competition and administrative abilities being used by the FIA. While I agree that women have an advantage when it comes to seeking sponsorship in motorsport, James’ point about there being no parallel series for women is well made. Such series might, perhaps ironically, enable women to develop their skills to a high standard without their being so much under the spotlight until they are ready for ‘open’ competition.

Re Michele Mouton, my favourite memory of her is watching her duel with Malcolm Wilson on the Scottish Rally in the mid-80′s. Malcolm beat her comprehensively on the notorious Drummond Hill stage, which features some very nasty corners with a long drop to Loch Tay, and afterwards commented “The trouble with Michele is that she hasn’t got the balls for it!” Unfair but very funny.

I’ve always thought of Michelle Mouton as being the perfect female competitor : She asked for and got no special treatment and competed on an equal basis with the men. I watched her on a few events and particularly remember her flat out and sideways cutting the corner across the grass opposite Goodwood House at the FOS. Brilliant !

On a wider point, except in sports where they are at a clear physical disadvantage, women should want to compete on an equal basis with men. That ensures they get to the top on merit.

The last thing any self respecting woman would want to see is a race series just for women.

I know women who HATE Danica,they think she is ruining it for women in racing.I believe the opposite is true,she has opened the floodgates.But you must want to win above ALL else,guy or girl.Your off track activities cannot reduce your focus one iota.

In Bahrain people were so complimentary of Mario Andretti.Because he will never lose his winning attitude,and any racer must have that first,and everything else is second to it.

Having a woman come into F1 too soon could cause bigger problems later on – arguing that a woman should be in F1 as soon as possible is, in my opinion, ridiculous and I’m shocked you think this. Does this mean that no matter what her talent level, a woman should be in F1? What if she isn’t any good? Would that be acceptable?

Women do need to be taken seriously in motorsport but encouraging any old woman into F1 simply for the sake of being a woman is demeaning and not the right approach.

When there is a woman good enough, she will get into F1. Simple as that.

Artificially promoting female drivers is a cheap publicity stunt, if they are quick then they should be able to race against the men without outside help. There was a television programme called Formula Woman [as far as I can remember] and it was truly awful, they didn’t choose people for their driving ability but rather for their ‘reality profile’ so that they could boast a good mix. I believe it was won by the sister of….. no, sorry it’s gone! but I don’t recall ever seeing her again. Turn up and drive series such as Ginetta and Caterham seem to have attracted some good people but when the going gets tougher the majority seem to give up. The FIA is wasting it’s money of it thinks a commission will do anything but give more jobs for the boys [and Michele].

That depends on if you are looking for a racing driver or a pin-up….. and that, of course, is the root of the problem. The FIA want to appear PC and equal opportunity and all that, but only superficially and only short term.

Who’s to say that the sport hasn’t lost a potential Vettel in the last five years?

I believe there are lots of Vettels, Rooneys, Nadals and Tigers out there that could of have been world beaters. I am convinced there are adults who have never raced karts or shown any interest in motorsport at all who have all of the attributes to be world champions. There paths just never crossed.

I think you’re quite right about that. I’ve been racing and working in motorsport for nearly 20 years now and I’ve no doubt that an awful lot of talent goes to waste because it simply nevers occurs to people that they may have natural ability.

That’s largely a product of it being an expensive and/or impractical thing to find out, but when I’m at karting events I always tell the novices not to worry about speed and that some people just ‘get it’ from the outset. The number of people who have that natural speed is surprisingly high, I’d guess somewhere in the region of 1 in 30, and I suspect a lot of them could’ve gone a long way had they been nurtured at the right age.

At least motorsport doesn’t discriminate against women like so many other sports do, in fact any team would be glad to have a fast female driver, as they would generate more publicity and therefore sponsorship.

Yeah but at the expense of other sometimes more deserving competitors. (unless the f/male was able to run up near the front, of course). I’d like nothing better than to see a female running near the front in a F1 race, but I would want her to recieve the same attention as the males she is competing with, not having the TV cameras, editors, pit interviewers, magazines, etc., in her face all the time, forceing her every move on us just because she’s got some cleavage!
PK.

Don’t talk “deserving.” Thats a subjective judgement.
And you’re overlooking the fact that there are *guys in motorsport right now that are ONLY there because they bring money to the table. And that usually means they have some PR skills, or possibly rich, Brazilian dads.

ALL THIS SEXISM AND SEXUAL BULLYING ON THIS PAGE REALLY IS PATHETIC BEYOND WORDS.

I CAN SEE THAT ALL YOU LITTLE BOYS ARE EVER SO SCARED OF WOMEN OUT-COMPETING WITH YOU, BUT ITS ABOUT TIME WOMEN WERE GIVEN A CHANCE.

AND NO ONE SAID ANYTHING ABOUT WOMEN BEING GIVEN AN EASY ROUTE INTO MOTORSPORT, YET I’VE READ MANY COMMENTS ON HERE SAYING SUCH THINGS. HOW CAN YOU JUDGE SOMETHING AND BITCH ABOUT IT WHEN ITS NOT EVEN REALITY, BUT JUST MALE FEAR OF BEING OUT-COMPETED AS ALWAYS? STOP YOUR BITCHING AND GIVE US A BLOODY CHANCE. A CHANCE. ITS ALL WOMEN WANT. NOT AN EASY RIDE, NOT SPECIAL RULES TO GIVE THEM THE UPPER HAND. JUST A CHANCE. THIS SITE SHOWS JUST HOW STRONGLY APPOSED MEN STILL ARE TO GIVING WOMEN A FAIR CHANCE. STOP BEING SO SCARED, AND FEAR WILL STOP DRIVING YOUR SEXISM.
SEXISM= FEAR OF WOMEN BEING BETTER THAN MEN.

I’m sorry Sarah, I can’t agree with you on a number of points! One of them is your comment about an “easy route”, I garantee if you interview every single TOPLINE driver in motor sport not one of them will agree they had an “easy route”, they will ALL have worked hard, scrimped, taken major financial risks, and gone through hell to get were they are. You generally find the drivers that had the easiest route, i.e., golden handshake, are never able to get anywhere near the top. Among other things you’re also VERY wrong about us being “scared”.
PK.

Sarah, there’s only one thing I can say to that: Iron my shirt, there’s a love.

But to put all joking aside you do raise a relevant discussion point which is reflective of society as a whole and possibly goes to the heart of why it’s been difficult to get women into motorsport.

I’m afraid I disagree with your viewpoint on it though. It isn’t sexism and fear of women doing better that stops men often giving women a chance – it’s a fear that if they don’t pass muster and they fire them, the woman will jump up and down claiming sexism.

Yes women want a chance – but unfortunately many play the sexism card when that chance doesn’t pay off. It’s a brave man in the modern world who’ll risk that in such a high value arena. Hopefully more and more will do exactly that, but the women also have to accept it has nothing to do with gender if they get booted too.

Maybe I’m incredibly naive, but I thought it was refreshing how open minded most of the comments are on here, particularly the genuine enthusiasm for a woman to succeed on her merits, not to just have a few pretty faces.

The overall opinion seems to be that anyone is welcome and will be embraced by fans if they’re fast enough, regardless of sex, race, nationality or looks.

Ok Sarah so why aren’t you an F1 driver then?
Who stopped you in the Karting, the junior formulae, F3 etc.

If you are good enough you should go for it. But don’t forget that probably only 10% of aspiring feeder formula drivers ever make it into F1, and a lot of them only last one season.
Determintation and willingness to sacrifice all the way up to F1 standard is required and then luck and talent are the only criteria, mostly luck.
But if you haven’t struggled through all the junior formulea don’t expect to jump the queue.

“It is common for young girls to be very competitive in karting but then the difficulty of finding funding and being taken seriously as they work their way up the ladder means a significant drop off in numbers. Who’s to say that the sport hasn’t lost a potential Vettel in the last five years?”

It isn’t common at all for girls to be competitive in top flight karting. Very recently we’ve had two or three girls make a mark – Laura Tillet and Michelle Gatting – but they are very rare indeed. The idea there is a drop-off in numbers doesn’t really stack up because I don’t see scores of woman racing karts and then stopping because they can’t afford cars.

The idea they find it especially hard to find sponsorship is somewhat naive to the realities of motorsport though. Every driver finds it hard to find sponsorship, and arguably competitive girl racers certainly attract more sponsorship interest!

Motorsport is a money game. Unless you really are super-human you WILL NOT get spotted and picked up. 90% of motorsport money comes from family.

I think that having women in F1 would be like inviting females to enter a men’s tennis grand slam tournament.

Sure they would be able to beat a few of the journeymen, but would probably fall by the wayside further along the line.

We have had enough journeymen in F1 over the last few years…let’s not add journeywomen to the list.

If a female turns out to be a really great driver then she will naturally rise to the top, and will inevitably attract a disproportionate amount of sponsorship…you only have to look at Danica Patrick as an example.

If there was a female good enough to be in F1 then surely she would be there by now.

Michele Mouton simply a class act,now gentleman if only you could be as good.not. Motorsport is completely dominated by men,yet here we are ponticating about “drivers”.
If any of us men included had the skill to drive a an Audi Quattro like Mouton then and only then could you honestly comment,as men…
Any “men” read about Pat Moss Carrlson?